Dinner At Antibo Italian in Derby
Published On Tuesday 4 Aug 2015 by Sticky Beak
See Recent Dining Out Reviews | See All Recent Reviews
The Boy Wonder and I are always poking around on the internet as you know, and every so often a little gem comes up that piques our interest. On this particular occasion it was a voucher for Antibo, offering 2 courses for 2 people for £15, valid Monday-Friday for starters up to the value of £4.95 and main courses up to the value of £8.95, which to be fair offered a great choice of dishes. You could still order the steaks and other dishes and just pay the difference, but we opted to stick within the original conditions just to see what variety there was.
The restaurant itself is fairly large and open plan and decorated very neutrally, but the pictures on the walls and arches give it a nice feel. I also liked the fact that you could see into the kitchen area and watch the chefs at work. There were already some diners in the venue when we arrived just before 6.45pm, and another couple of tables arrived a couple of minutes after us; some diners were also using the vouchers and some weren’t.
Our server Chloe took our drinks orders and left us to have a look through the menu for a couple of minutes. I decided to have the Avocado and Baby Mozzarella for my starter and His Nibs chose the Homemade Brandy Pate served with warm bread. The Pate had a wonderfully smooth texture and rich taste to it, and you could discern the Brandy in it too. The bread was fresh and just nicely warmed through, and the whole dish was nicely presented.
My own starter was equally well received and was very tasty. I always think the simple tastes of fresh Tomato, Avocado and Mozzarella is criminally undervalued and I love the association of the Italian flag in its colours too. Again, my starter was beautifully presented and nicely put together with fresh Rocket leaves and Balsamic glaze finishing it off. As the evening progressed more and more diners arrived and soon the eating area was filled with the quiet hum of chatter.
For our main courses we went for the classic dish of Tagliatelle Carbonara (Bacon, Egg yolks and Cream with Parmesan cheese) and Risotto Milan (luxury seafood mixed with Onions). Both dishes were of a very pleasing portion size and were absolutely piping hot; you could see steam billowing from the tops of the dishes. We were offered Parmesan cheese and fresh ground Black Pepper to accompany our meals. I accepted the Pepper and His Nibs had extra cheese sprinkled over his food.
The Man Birds Carbonara was deliciously creamy and the sauce coated the ribbons of Tagliatelle beautifully, and he said that the Ham was a good quality too. My own risotto was equally yummy with its bountiful amount of Baby Octopus, Squid, Prawns, King Prawns and in-shell Mussels. All the seafood was cooked very well (none of it was at all chewy), and the rice was nice and creamy with just the right amount of seasoning. Needless to say there was a lull in conversation at our table as we tucked in to our food with gusto. We also ordered a garlic bread to accompany our main courses and this had a very nice thin, crisp base to it and a great flavour. As with all good Italian food our little tummies were full to the brim, so we asked Chloe to give us 10 minutes grace before bringing the dessert menu over for us to look at.
After a little bit of deliberation we settled on homemade Profiteroles and the Cherry and Biscotti cheesecake (the homemade Tiramisu had sold out) for our pudding. The Choux buns were lovely and light textured and filled with a really nice sweet patisserie crème; and for once they weren’t absolutely drowned in chocolate, just nicely drizzled with it so that all the flavours could be appreciated. I had several whole cherries in my portion of cheesecake which I really liked, and the texture of the topping was just right; some cheesecakes can be very heavy and rich which is not always what you want at the end of a meal. As is our custom, we finished off our meals with a couple of lattes and reflected on our evening.
I would quite happily recommend Antibo to friends and family for somewhere to eat, and so I feel confident to recommend it to you dear reader. The premises are spotlessly clean and the staff are smartly turned out and very polite. Service was very prompt and questions dealt with most professionally. It is located a little way from the main city centre, close to the train station, so ideal if you come into Derby by this method rather than the bus. Antibo currently has a discount offer valid until the end of August 2015; just visit their Facebook Page to get further details. Keep up the good work team Antibo :)
| Sunday Lunch At The Restaurant At The Renishaw It was another Sunday (where are the weeks going this year?!), which meant a jaunt out with Mummy Bird for a roast dinner. The Man had done some scouting around and consulted our list Read The Article | |
| Sunday Lunch At The Robin Hood Near Baslow Before you all jump on me, I'm just going to clarify that I do like the warmer weather. But.... Come on, 30 degrees+ is just too much for a pasty English Rose; I can't function: I'm sweaty, lethargic Read The Article | |
| Dinner At Roka Turkish Kitchen In Ripley After a day at the Spa, the last thing either myself or The Man wanted to do was cook! We scratched our heads as to whether to get food delivered, order pick-up takeaway or just bite the bullet and go out Read The Article | |
| Dinner At Nicco Restaurant & Bar, Pride Park, Derby The Man and I have eaten in Pride Park before, but this was our first visit to Nicco Restaurant and Bar. I'm happy to say that the car park is a decent size and we found a spot for the jalopy Read The Article | |
| Out For Dinner At The Merchant's Yard In Tideswell I've always been a huge fan of our stunning scenery here in the Shire, but I'd forgotten just how glorious the scenery is on the drive up to Monsal Head. Even with storm clouds threatening Read The Article | |
| Sunday Lunch At The Bulls Head Inn, Foolow The Man and I had kindly been invited along for the Sunday Roast at The Bulls Head Inn at Foolow and, I tell you what, you'd be hard-pressed to find a traditional English village Read The Article | |
| Sunday Roast Platter By Hogbroast At The Mixing House, Derby Well, what a blast from the past! The Man and I were kindly invited along by Matt and Jordan of HogBroast to sample their Sunday Roast Platter at The Mixing House Read The Article | |
| Back To The Village Inn In Marehay For Their Pizzas The first rule of life? Don't razz your Mummy off; or, if you prefer to look at it a different way, keep Mummy on-side. Happy Mummy = Happy Sticky = Happy Man Bird, Fledge, BB etc.. Read The Article | |
| Out For Dinner At The Dog In Pentrich The Dog at Pentrich is [now] the sister site to Tony's Bar and Grill in Beeston, a restaurant His Nibs and I recently visited, and enjoyed. It's been a fair while since we've pootled out to Pentrich, so Read The Article | |
| Sunday Lunch At The Scotsmans Pack, Hathersage I don't care what anyone says, as a Brit, there's one meal that screams home: the iconic Sunday Roast. The Man and I were on our way to Hathersage and The Scotsman's Pack Country Read The Article | |